Museology

Met Defends Suggestive Painting of Girl After Petition Calls for Its Removal

| Dana

“The Metropolitan Museum of Art will not remove a controversial painting by the French painter known as Balthus from public display. The painting, entitled “Thérèse Dreaming” (1938), depicts a young girl in a suggestive pose that leaves her underwear visible.

In reference to the museum’s decision, the Met’s chief communications officer, Ken Weine, said, “Moments such as this provide an opportunity for conversation, and visual art is one of the most significant means we have for reflecting on both the past and the present and encouraging the continuing evolution of existing culture through informed discussion and respect for creative expression.”

Ford Foundation and Walton Family Foundation Launch $6 Million Effort to Diversify Art Museum Leadership

| Dana

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ford-foundation-and-walton-family-foundation-launch-6-million-effort-to-diversify-art-museum-leadership-300562243.html

The Diversifying Art Museum Leadership Initiative will fund 20 pioneering programs at the following art museums:

  • Andy Warhol Museum, in Pittsburgh, PA, for a multi-tiered pipeline project including a youth outreach program, internships, and alumni and mentoring programs.
  • The Art Institute of Chicago, in Chicago, IL, to expand the museum’s internship programs, and provide mentorship and leadership training for staff.
  • Clark Atlanta University Art Museum, in Atlanta, GA, and Zuckerman Museum of Art at Kennesaw State University, in Kennesaw, GA, for shared post-baccalaureate fellowships.
  • Cleveland Museum of Art, in Cleveland, OH, for a Curatorial Arts Mastery program, career apprenticeships for undergraduate students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and research fellowships.
  • Fisk University Galleries, in Nashville, TN, to develop a new two-year undergraduate museum leadership development certificate program at the university.
  • Hood Museum of Art, in Hanover, NH, to support an associate curator, postdoctoral fellow, and undergraduate intern focused on Native American art.
  • Institute of Contemporary Art, in Boston, MA, for a teen leadership program, museum internships, and post-graduate curatorial fellowships.
  • Pérez Art Museum Miami, in Miami, FL, for a post-baccalaureate curatorial fellowship to curate exhibitions based on the museum’s permanent collection.
  • Los Angeles County Museum of Art, in Los Angeles, CA, to support two-year baccalaureate fellowships to work with the director and head of curatorial affairs.
  • Minneapolis Institute of Art, in Minneapolis, MN, to expand the Native American Fellowship Program and support fellowships for students from diverse cultural backgrounds.
  • Museum of Contemporary Art Santa Barbara, in Santa Barbara, CA, to support internships and professional development training for staff and junior curators.
  • National Museum of Mexican Art and DuSable Museum of African American History, in Chicago, IL, for joint curatorial fellowships, teen workshops, and a mentorship program.
  • New Orleans Museum of Art, in New Orleans, LA, to support internships for students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities.
  • Newark Museum of Art, in Newark, NJ, for an intensive three-year internship program for undergraduate students.
  • Oakland Museum of California, in Oakland, CA, to support a three-year summer internship, cohort-learning, and leadership development program for undergraduate and graduate level students.
  • Phoenix Art Museum, in Phoenix, AZ, for an annual teen art council, internships for undergraduate and graduate students, and curatorial fellowships focused on Latinx art.
  • Reynolda House Museum of American Art, in Winston-Salem, NC, for post-baccalaureate fellowships, undergraduate internships, and cultural competency and unconscious bias trainings for staff.
  • Saint Louis Art Museum, in St. Louis, MO, to sustain, evaluate, and disseminate lessons from its Romare Bearden Minority Museum Fellowship program.
  • The Studio Museum in Harlem, in New York, NY, for high school, college, and graduate internships, trainings for museum educators, professional development, and a curatorial fellowships partnership with the Museum of Modern Art.
  • Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience, in Seattle, WA, for professional development for the museum’s junior staff, paid internships for high school and college students, and a young artist development program.

The Diversifying Art Museum Leadership Initiative is fiscally sponsored by Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.

 

SOURCE Ford Foundation

Related Links

http://www.fordfoundation.org

Feminism + Museums

| Dana

“In two volumes (each 600+ pages), Feminism and Museums explores how museums are responding to these wider socio-political challenges, in which they too play a part. In an unprecedented range, depth and variety of case studies and analyses these volumes present feminist actions, interventions and disruptions which are impacting the processes of collecting, learning, interpretation and engagement in today’s museums, galleries and heritage organisations.”

Museums, Etc.’s Feminism and Museum, Volumes I &II

 

Feminism and Museums

Women Recount Decades of Sexual Harassment and Assault in the Art World

| Dana
Betty Tompkins, Dear Betty…., 2013.

It’s hard to call recent revelations of sexual harassment in the art world “revelations,” a word that implies something previously unknown. Indeed, the overwhelming response from women and others in the industry was summed up elegantly by the hashtag #NotSurprised. Why are we not surprised? For as long as men have had power over women—that is to say, millennia—some of them have abused that power. That instinct traverses time, space, and industry. Women have also been routinely discouraged from careers in the arts. When, years ago, Martha Wilson approached her mentor for advice about being an artist, for instance, he responded: “Women don’t make it in the art world.” Artsy spoke to other women who came up in the art world in the ’60s, ’70s, and ’80s about their experiences with sexism and harassment, and what they hope will change in the future. These personal accounts have been condensed and edited, and anonymity has been granted where requested.

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-women-recount-decades-sexual-harassment-assault-art

 

Curator Gavin Delahunty Resigns from Dallas Museum of Art, Citing ‘Allegations Regarding Inappropriate Behavior’ [UPDATED]

| Dana

http://www.artnews.com/2017/11/18/gavin-delahunty-resigns-dallas-museum-art-citing-allegations-regarding-inappropriate-behavior/

Curator Gavin Delahunty has resigned from the Dallas Museum of Art, citing “allegations regarding . . . inappropriate behavior.”

Delahunty joined the museum as Hoffman Family Senior Curator of Contemporary Art in spring 2014 from Tate Liverpool, where he had served as Head of Exhibitions and Displays from 2010-2014. His full statement, emailed to colleagues and to ARTnews, is below.

Symposium on Creating, Curating, and Studying Black Art

| Dana

https://artsinitiative.osu.edu/events/department-african-american-and-african-studies-symposium-creating-curating-and-studying

All events are free and open to the public
Register here.

In celebration of the exhibition of Start at Home: Art from the Frank W. Hale, Jr. Black Cultural Center Collection, this symposium brings together artists, museum professionals, and scholars of Black art. The two-day event includes artist talks by Alison Saar and Fahamu Pecou; a keynote lecture on museums in the era of Black Power by Dr. Susan Cahan (Temple University); and a talk about “Black Art Futures” by Dr. LeRonn Brooks (Lehman College). Symposium panels will address the history of Black Art in Ohio and beyond, past and current practices of curating and exhibiting Black art, and the practice of Black art as resistance.

Thursday, October 19
All events at the Hale Black Cultural Center, unless otherwise noted

Nicole Fleetwood graduate student workshop
in University Hall Room 386
11:30 AM-1:30 PM

Making Black Art Now
Opening keynote with artist Alison Saar
Introduction by Lawrence Williamson, Jr. Director of the Hale Black Cultural Center
at Urban Arts Space
5 PM-6:30 PM

Friday, October 20
All events at the Hale Black Cultural Center, unless otherwise noted

Continental Breakfast & Chair’s Welcome
8:30 AM-9 AM

Curating and Exhibiting Black Art: Past and Present
with Lawrence Williamson, Jr., Director of Hale Black Cultural Center and curator of the Hale Black Cultural Center art collection, Deidre Hamlar (independent curator), and Lucy Mensah from Detroit Institute of Arts
9 AM-10:30 AM

Black Art in Ohio in the 1960s and 70s
Panel led by Dr. Horace Newsum (H. Ike Okafor-Newsum), Emeritus Professor, The Ohio State University
Panelists: Queen Brooks, April Sunami, Bettye Stull, Willis “Bing” Davis, Shirley Bowen
10:30 AM-12 PM

Lunch + talk by Dr. Susan Cahan (Temple University) on “The Museum in the Age of Black Power” (talk starts at 12:30 PM)
12 PM-1:30 PM

Art as Resistance
with Melissa Crum, independent Scholar & entrepreneur; Simone Drake, The Ohio State University; Nicole Fleetwood, Rutgers University
1:30 PM-3:00 PM

Artist Talk: Fahamu Pecou, visual/performing artist and scholar
3 PM-4 PM

Closing Keynote: LeRonn Brooks (Lehman College) on Black Art Futures
at King Arts Complex
5:30 PM

This symposium is presented by the Frank W. Hale, Jr. Black Cultural Center, the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, The Ohio State University; The Arts Initiative; Urban Arts Space; the Department of African American and African Studies; the Department of History of Art; the Arts and Humanities Discovery Themes; and King Arts Complex.

 

Thomas Campbell, Former Director of the Met

| Dana

“Campbell, born in Singapore, raised in the UK and educated at Oxford and the Courtald Institute of Art in London, arrived at the Met as an assistant curator in 1995. “Tapestry Tom”, as he came to be known, is the first to admit that his appointment as director 14 years later came as much as a surprise to him as his colleagues. While he had curated critically acclaimed exhibitions, he was not seen as an obvious leader, nor as his predecessor Philippe de Montebello’s heir apparent.

“When they first approached me, I thought, ‘My god, you’ve got to be joking’,” Campbell recalled. “But when I thought about it, there was a logic to it. I was a mid-career curator who was passionate about the museum and its mission and had perhaps a fairly good idea of how it needed to evolve.”

 

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/25/former-met-boss-thomas-campbell-i-was-passionate-about-the-museum-and-its-mission

The Museum as Host in a Polarized World

| Dana

“Museums are essentially social spaces, where people of all sorts can congregate. They are not neutral spaces, nor can they absolve themselves from complicity in colonialism or embedding privilege. They can however act as a starting point and stand for values which are non-negotiable such as religious tolerance, respect for the rule of law, the rights of minorities.”

 

If not here, where? – the museum as host in a polarised world